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FEAR

I’ve updated Robert Indiana’s iconic sculpture “LOVE” for our times! While “Love” may have been an appropriate sentiment from 1964 to 1970 when the 2D and 3D versions were made, I think that the revised text is more appropriate for the 2000’s and 2010’s. Fear is 8” tall and 4” deep, and while not a monumental outdoor sculpture, FEAR appears fairly sizable on a table top.

Fear, which is solid aluminum and weighs over 7 lbs, was cast last Thursday with quite a few other pieces. The great thing about having an aluminum foundry at the Makerspace is that the whole thing cost about $7! – $4 for propane, $1 for Styrofoam, and $3 for some Rotozip bits. If FEAR were cast in bronze, it would weigh over 20 lbs, which would cost $200 for the metal alone. As it is, we melted down old heat sinks, stock cutoffs and hard drive frames, so the metal is essentially free.

In the spirit of Indiana who made his own font, I drew FEAR up in Inkscape using Georgia Bold, but I increased the height of the Serifs a bit. Shane helped me with the file manipulation and G-code generation (Thanks!), so I could use the CNC router to cut FEAR out of styrofoam. I exported FEAR’s hairline thickness outline as .dxf so it I could bring it into CamBam to generate the G-code. The outer contour of FEAR was selected, and the following settings were chosen:

General -> Enabled -> True

General -> Name -> Outside

Cutting Depth -> Clearance Plane -> 0.125 (inches)

Cutting Depth -> Depth Increment -> 1.05 (inches)

Cutting Depth -> Target Depth -> -1.05 (inches)

Feedrates -> Cut Feedrate -> 300 (inches per second)

Options -> Roughing/Finishing -> Finishing

Tool -> Tool Diameter -> 0.125 (inches)

Tool -> Tool Profile -> End Mill

Identical settings were chosen for the inner contours of FEAR, with the exception of General -> Name -> Inside. Then, I just selected “Generate G-code.” Check out the real-time video of Makerspace CNC router running the G-code and cutting out the 1” thick Styrofoam (Owens Corning Foamular 150).

After cutting four 1” thick pieces, they were stacked and glued together. I buried the foam FEAR in petrobond, and then attached Styrofoam sprues and vents. For a more complete explanation of the quick lost-styrofoam casting process, check out this post. Stay tuned for details of our next Aluminum pour, which will be in January in the New Milwaukee Makerspace!